thinking about a new year and new work....

I am wicked impatient, compulsive and impulsive, and rarely like to make the same work repetitively.  Many potters ONLY make the same work over and over again. I have a few items I have made more than once over the years like popular elephant mugs and piggy banks, but lord, don't make me do more than ten at once.
Mostly I follow the leadings of my restless mind.  I never go anywhere, but my mind does.  It seems like every December I am thinking of some big changes to explore in the new year and I start messing around once the holiday rush is over.  My rush is ending but the experiments have begun.
I'll show what I mean more clearly tomorrow and the next day, but this gives you an idea of ONE of the big new ideas percolating....
(frog mug with leaves by Gary Rith)

getting...to the end?

I visited a potter friend Monday, my car full of pots for the post office including one going to England--can a box get to England in 9 days?.  Her front porch?  Full of just packed pots also for the PO-- I am delivering by hand several items today, later this week. Its like, you are in a grocery store parking lot passing over your POT, getting cash back--a shady looking deal, but really! Just a piggy bank or bowl....

ANYWAY, fine with me if it  never stops, right?  Gotta earn some coin.  But the rush is starting to slow, and I think today is the last day the PO promises priority will get there....



(new pots by Gary Rith)

preppie mating symbol....

I tell the wife "made an alligator bowl today, tail up!" and we remember what that meant back in the 80s....yuppies could spy each other across the dance floor, and the tail up on their shirt meant they were ready and willing to mate with their own kind.....

WELL ANYWAY, have the awesome Tuesday!

(new alligator pots by Gary Rith)

Score! The lucky wagon joins the lucky blue table...

So you know I am at my last fair of the year Sunday (and YES, my aching body  slept like the dead last night) and it was a first, in some ways.
As you see below, I don't recall ever loading the vehicle when I was in snow almost up to my knees in our driveway...I s'pose I could have shoveled there, right? Also, my lucky blue table on the roof?  It has never ridden atop the car before.  I mean, I found it on the street for free, so it is not unused to the elements, and it is a tough little trooper....I find that when I go to fairs with it I do SUPER GOOD sales...really!

But you see that wagon up there in the middle?  The last picture of these shows my buddy Nance and her colorful display. Which HAD a wagon in it, a small, puppy size wagon.  The name of this show was Little Red Wagon, so Nance borrowed a little red wagon from a friend who slapped a price tag on it saying "if you can sell it, do!".  Nance was displaying jewelry on it.

She was setting up and I grabbed it and threw some cash at her with a jaunty "No tax, and you'll give me a discount, won't you?" and she was like "wait, you can't take it now, it's my display!!!".

I took it.  It became MY display.  Later another friend told her I had doubled the price and sold it to HER for a tidy little profit and Nance was steamed...until she heard the laughter....
I am not selling it, now it is MY lucky little red wagon.  Nice part of the display, hmm?


My old pal Christi organized this thing.  If I WAS tired, imagine how tired she might be?
Awesome season, now to ship some boxes.....


Nance below, WITHout the little wagon....

last day....

If you came over to the studio on Dec. 25th I would sell you pots....heck, ANY day.

But today is my last fair of the year. (come see me!)
And there has been a flutter of orders to ship this weekend, which is awesome.  It is possible that any package sent NEXT weekend priority would make it to another US destination by the 24th...but as I told a woman in England asking whether a mug would arrive in 2 weeks...I give that a 50-50 chance.  I don't really know, but considering shipping a mug to the UK costs a lot more than my mug, I want to be realistic and keep people happy, and honesty is always the best retail policy.

SO, my point is, if you ordering from me to ship in the US, this is IT, do it now, right? From my etsy gallery to you!

I'm gonna have fun today, hope you do too....
(new pottery by Gary Rith)

chocolate covered golden doodle...

I have the last fair of 2014 Sunday. Great things are happening in the studio (see below), and business has been excellent all year (you hope that formula works out:  great pots = great sales, right? :). I am already working on stuff for 2015! Which is even MORE thrilling.  More on that next week....

OK, but here's the thing, my sideline, my hobby?  Dog walking and cat sitting?  What was an occasional thing has become this BIG thrilling beast of a 2nd career. Starting now I have to say NO to any new customers, and here is why:
Except for the chickens (who will probably need me over Christmas), I will see ALL of my clients this week, for example.  Usually  it is one here and there, walk a dog, say hello to a cat, but here in early winter at the end of the retail season I need to see ALL of them (if it was last month I would have been a quivering bundle of retailer nerves):  Yogi, Soupy and Nook the dogs will all need walks, both Scoop and Puffy the cats (remember Puffy from long ago? No?  Don't worry, I'll blog her won't I?) AND the icing on the cake will be Kiko, a new dog needing nearly daily walks for the foreseeable future....

OK, here is my crazy Friday.  I had Yogi in the studio or outside playing with Penny all morning and went out to meet a new customer, Kiko!  When I got the call on Kiko I was like "oh gosh, can I handle ANOTHER?" and our Penny was like "go for it, I need my walks, but not in THIS crappy weather" and I was like "OK Penny, you'll still get walks but pottery is quiet in the winter, I CAN HANDLE adding Kiko".

So I go over there and have the awesome visit--the house is full of POTTERY.  I have been hired because the family wants a potter who walks dogs (how many of THOSE are there, right?).  And we walk and talk and I agree to start Monday and....Kiko disappears.  Kiko has a perfect fenced in yard...what...?  Kiko's owner drives off in one direction, I in the other, to circle the blocks...it is all pretty tense.  Kiko is a sweetie, nobody wants an accident! And guess who finds Kiko.........ME.
I am the hero of the day, Dog Whisperer extraordinaire!  You better believe I am hired ;)

OK, but wait, after that anxiety attack I get home and need to take Yogi out...and WTF?!  Yogi smells like Hershey, PA, the house smells like Santa's chocolate factory and he is lying in a pile of....cocoa powder all over the carpet.  Yogi got into a HUGE bag of cocoa powder.  I make the calls, get him out of their cocoa infested house and take him into the snow at our place.  He is not off-white, he is now a big chocolate doodle.  The family runs home to care for him....he is fine, but oi, what a mess, what an adventure.....in 2 years there has never been a pet mishap, in one hour there were TWO.

Dig these recent pots, have a great weekend, come see me if you can :)

(new pottery by Gary Rith)

forget the pots, IT'S SNOWY!

It is true, I have all these fine pots to show you, but probably all my California and southern friends agree that a boatload of snow is MUCH more fun to look at today.  Maybe not on their lawn, but on MY lawn.
We live in probably the most Christmassy place on earth.  We have the "over the river and through the woods"  right here! And such a pretty little church....and beagle....

Below, Baptist church in center of Etna...


Penny in our back yard...the rock to her right suggests we got up to a foot in spots...


Our house!  Yesterday's house picture was across the street, there was some confusion...hard to see but our only outward holiday decoration is the Danish hearts on each door.


River looking south toward Mt. Pleasant.


The bridge has an open steel deck...cool pattern, eh?


Downtown Etna--church on right, PO on left.  That's it!  All we got :)


Looking north at the river---our back yard is just there on the right as the river bends....

not exactly Buffalo, but STILL up to a foot.....

We were s'posed to get an easy 3 inches over 2 days....
not exactly.  There was still school yesterday, but right now it looks like we got a foot or more.  These pictures show things when it was still just a few inches, Soupy the neighbor's corgi and our Penny plus Soupy's house in the snow across the street....
IF THAT ISN'T CHRISTMASSY I don't know what is :)
(with flash and without, cool eh?)

 

have a ...GODZILLA Christmas....

Do Jewish people look at American Christians and think they are nuttiest people on EARTH?
I was driving past a school yesterday and saw its neighbor has huge blow up stuff all over the yard, and this Godzilla Santa cracked me up so I took the picture...but the more I look at it, the more I say
"should the designer of that thing have maybe placed the tree....a little higher.... or maybe it would be better for no tree.....maybe a bag of toys at his side?  Because it looks like Godzilla Santa has ...um, unusual predilections."

As far as American Christians and decorations go, I am a Quaker as many of you remember, and we believe no day is more sacred than another.  Including December 25th.  We also tend to go a little toward the plain side with decorations. Doesn't mean we don't have celebrations or decorations, but maybe try for a little less.....excess.....although, as  a retailer, I dearly hope that people will be excessive when they shop my work ;)

Everybody loves piggies with corks in their nose, but I like to make sitting ones too...there is a slot in back....the ones below the sitting pigs are for an order, and I was surprised to find I used my LAST 2 corks on them...had to order more...


IN OTHER news, I am babysitting Scoop the cat this week...she is, as you recall, a favorite of mine.
She goes bananas when I come to the door....

gluten-free vegan veggie burger!

I havn't had meat in...decades.  Then, of course, I had to take out dairy and gluten...what are we left with????? SO MANY THINGS!
Veggie burgers from the store can be tasty, of course, but they often have gluten...and I figured there had to be an easy way to do something with black beans, etc and came across this recipe that basically uses 4 simple things ground up together:  spice, cooked rice and sweet potato and black beans, that is IT! And OH my, so delish...makes you wonder why everybody thinks cooking has to be complicated and difficult....
AND like I said yesterday, I like avocado whipped with lemon juice, what a perfect topping on there....
have an awesome Tuesday!

avocado lemon...

There are a lot of ways to enjoy avocado, but more about that in a second...
I had a fine fair yesterday at Temple Beth-El.  Old friends everywhere I looked!  I was pretty cold and tired at day's end and the dog and I fell asleep probably around 7...I dreamt I was running the Boston marathon and the Queen was along the way taste testing ice cream, and she dramatically spit out some she didn't like...in another dream I got a puppy and played with it all night...that, folks, is the glamorous life of the artist, right? Next Sunday I have the last fair of the year and cannot wait! I think it might be a pretty big deal....

OK, avocados, right?  You can slice them and eat them on your taco or salad or rice, you can mash it with spice and lime etc and make guacamole, but my favorite?  Courtesy of Martha Stewart who once suggested it:  just blenderize your avocado with lemon juice, that is IT!  It makes a lovely light green color, too, but it makes the most wonderful smear for any taco, potato, anything...

SO, that color?  I am tinkering with this glaze, see below, and it is that very avocado lemon color.  I hope that the glaze works out.....


(new teaset by Gary Rith)

little bundle of joy...

We gave up long ago, trying to keep the dog off the bed and sleeping in her own doggy bed.*  The cat took the dog bed, of course....

I am at a small local fair today, yippee! Temple Beth El, Ithaca, 9-3!

*We kept the dog off the bed for her first 3.5 weeks.  Then gave in.  I mean, c'mon, not only is she CUTE, but please, winter is COLD! Nothing better than a dog's warmth under the covers....

giant robotic hazmat suit....

Not sure what the reason was or the hazardous materials BUT I dreamt I needed to get into an enormous hazmat suit with robotic controls...a cool item, actually.  Naturally, in that dream, I passed the wife the camera so I could blog it the next day, as I do.....
(new frog mugs by Gary Rith)